Samoa, A Hundred Years Ago And Long Before eBook

to the ridge pole; then they do another row, and so
on all round the house. Two, three, or four thousand
of these fringed reeds may be required for a good-sized
house. This thatching, if well done, will last
for seven years. To collect the sugar-cane leaves,
and “sew,” as it is called, the ends on
to the reeds, is the work of the women. An active
woman will sew fifty reeds in a day, and three men
will put up and fasten on to the roof of the house
some five hundred in a day. Corrugated iron,
shingles, and other contrivances, are being tried by
European residents; but, for coolness and ventilation,
nothing beats the thatch. The great drawback
is, that in gales it stands up like a field of corn,
and then the rain pours into the house. That,
however, may be remedied by a network of cinnet, to
keep down the thatch, or by the native plan of covering
all in with a layer of heavy cocoa-nut leaves on the
approach of a gale.

These great circular roofs are so constructed that
they can be lifted bodily off the posts, and removed
anywhere, either by land, or by a raft of canoes.
But in removing a house, they generally divide the
roof into four parts—­viz. the two sides,
and the two ends, where there are particular joints
left by the carpenters, which can easily be untied,
and again fastened. There is not a single nail
in the whole building; all is made fast with cinnet.
As Samoan houses often form presents, fines, dowries,
as well as articles of barter, they are frequently
removed from place to place. The arrangement of
the houses in a village has no regard whatever to
order. You rarely see three houses in a line.
Every one puts his house on his little plot of ground,
just as the shade of the trees, the direction of the
wind, the height of the ground, etc., may suit
his fancy.

A house, after the usual Samoan fashion just described,
has but one apartment. It is the common
parlour, dining-room, etc., by day, and the bedroom
of the whole family by night. They do not, however,
altogether herd indiscriminately. If you peep
into a Samoan house at midnight, you will see five
or six low oblong tents pitched (or rather
strung up) here and there throughout the house.
They are made of native cloth, five feet high, and
close all round down to the mat. They shut out
the mosquitoes, and enclose a place some eight feet
by five; and these said tent-looking places may be
called the bedrooms of the family. Four
or five mats laid loosely, the one on the top of the
other, form the bed. The pillow
is a piece of thick bamboo, three inches in diameter,
three to five feet long, and raised three inches from
the mat by short wooden feet. The sick are indulged
with something softer, but the hard bamboo is the
invariable pillow of health. The bedding
in old times was complete with a single mat or sheet
of native cloth. In the morning the tent was unstrung,
mats, pillow, and sheet rolled together, and laid
up overhead on a shelf between the posts in the middle
of the house.